


Mission Status: Failure

by CaliBDiamond



Series: Just Malfunctioning [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Gen, Psychological Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-04
Updated: 2014-09-04
Packaged: 2018-02-16 03:27:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2254113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaliBDiamond/pseuds/CaliBDiamond
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is how it feels to fall apart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mission Status: Failure

There are days when she wonders if she should have ever trusted Jesse as much as she did. Following him into that death trap all those years ago has really put a damper on her life, though she supposes she can’t blame it all on that incident. After all, Jesse didn’t cause Aliens to pour out of a hole in the sky. But he had brought her into a loop of secrecy that would ruin her for years to come.

She could remember so clearly how excited she was to be going on such a dangerous mission. Jesse had made her swear not to tell a soul because she hadn’t been cleared for it; according to him, all she needed was a higher level agent with her. He told her very little about what they were even doing, and even less about where this place was located. All she’d known was that it was out of state and under the radar.

The nightmares Syriana would suffer from later on, painted a picture of a dark building filled with the kind of smell one might find in the back of a butcher shop. Death hung in the air and tainted her nostrils, but she’d trudged in after Jesse like a puppy, completely unprepared for what was waiting for them inside. She never knew where the first blow came from, but the brutal sounds of bones breaking beneath heavy boots and Jesse’s cries of agony would play back in her mind for years. She remembered being dragged along a cold, unforgivingly hard floor and left in a small room with her partner.

No windows, no light; just the dank smell of rotten blood and an inky darkness that made her skin crawl. When she was conscious enough to survey what little surroundings she could see, Syri found herself stripped of all her gear right down to her combat boots. Jesse didn’t move much where he lay, but whimpered every so often as if to let her know he was still hanging on. The first night was one of the worst.

Light had burst in when the iron door slid open and several men—she only guessed they were men; it was hard to tell who was beneath the visors of the riot helmets—came marching in. Two of them grabbed her and held her down with a knee to her back, one hand forcing her to turn her head while the others shined their lights on Jesse and surrounded him. She could hear muffled talking, but couldn’t make much sense of what was said, and she watched in horror as one man swung a foot back and kicked her partner straight in the head. Syri’s throat soon began to burn from her own screaming and begging for them to stop. Whatever Jesse had done, she was a part of. And she knew that when they were done, she’d be next.

She’d recall a needle being jabbed into the fleshy part of her arm, and feeling a kind of spinning sickness that reminded her of being wasted in the backseat of her ex-girlfriend’s car back in high school. Crawling to Jesse was a bit of a chore and a joke, but she managed to do it in spite of the blinding darkness and the dizzy feeling in her head. He was alive, but barely. Part of her knew he wasn’t going to last, but the other was so frantic and scared to be left alone that she could only bring herself to console him and promise that they’d be getting out of here.

Over the course of the next few days, the routine would continue. The group would barge in at random moments, hold her down and wail on Jesse until he was vomiting blood. Then they’d stick her and leave them to wallow in their separate agonies until the next unplanned visit.

Through it all, Syri had managed to find a small comfort in the sound of Jesse’s breathing. Wet and slow and disgusting, the sound served to remind her that she wasn’t dead yet and neither was he. They were still together in this, and they might even make it out at the end. But then came the morning when she awoke to silence. She lay there on her side, staring blankly at the wall in front of her, trying to figure out what it was that had startled her awake. It jostled her brains a bit to even attempt a rational thought, and numbed her to the core when she finally realized what had happened.

Jesse had escaped. Perhaps not in the way they both would have liked, but he’d left and he’d be safe from ever having to endure another savage beating. And Syri was to be alone in her suffering. Locked in a solid cage with the corpse of a man she once loved and trusted to keep her safe. She couldn’t cry. There wasn’t a damn tear left in her anymore. Absolute fear had swallowed her whole, and she was left shaking on the cold grimy floor to await her own fate.

The question of what she’d be made to endure would be answered over the next few nights. She hadn’t moved from her spot when the men came in, brandishing their needles and a new set of sharp, shiny toys. They spoke to her, but her head was so garbled that nothing made sense at all. So they cut her. For every answer she didn’t have, or each time she begged to be released, one of the goons would jab a blade into her skin and drag it along in a deep line that stung for hours after they’d left the room.

She had no recollection of time or much of anything after that; just darkness that occasionally brought pain and panic, and lasted for what felt like days. The events leading up to her waking up in a hospital with tubes sticking out every which way, and a horde of geared up agents standing on the other side of her door, were blurry and would take years to piece together.

She’d been on the edge of death from dehydration when she’d been recovered. No one would explain how S.H.I.E.L.D had managed to find her, or why she and Jesse had been taken in the first place. Relaying what she knew—when she was able to—only raised more questions without answers. The organization would pay for her hospital bills and her aftercare, and sent her to a psychologist across town where she’d be forced to relive the events as she remembered them three times a week for the next three years. They gave her pills and scheduled her for group meetings at the local VA to help with the trauma, but it only did so much for her in the end. When she was cleared to come back into work, she was put behind a desk and given a job meant to keep her brain as busy as possible. But still, the incident would haunt her and keep her from any real social contact for months.

It would be hard to trust anyone again, not that it had entirely been Jesse’s fault. Syri blamed herself just as much as she blamed her dead partner, and she was almost thankful to know she wasn’t going to be forced back out onto the field where horrible things would happen. She didn’t want to make any more mistakes like that.

The scarring on her abdomen would remain hidden beneath layered blouses and full length shirts, and if a one night stand ever asked about them, she lied. No sense in letting anyone know that she had once been broken down to nearly nothing. Night terrors and panic attacks would be tacked onto a long list of issues and symptoms that kept her from becoming more than just the girl sitting behind a computer screen in a corner, never speaking unless spoken to and always presenting herself as a cold, poised woman who took her job far too seriously.

But this job was all she had, and she was determined not to let her mental problems rule every aspect of her life.

At least, until her father’s heart attack.


End file.
